CODE OF CONDUCT

Article 2.3.3 of ICC's Code of Conduct

'Where
the facts of the alleged incident are not adequately or clearly covered
by any of the above offences, conduct that either: (a) is contrary to
the spirit of the game; or (b) brings the game into disrepute'.

Level 3 penalty

All
Level 3 breaches carry a penalty of between four and eight Suspension
Points. Two suspension points equates to a ban of one Test, or two ODIs,
depending on which type of match is scheduled next for the suspended
player.

The deep wounds inflicted by the nightmare tour of Australia and the bitter aftermath of the Kevin Pietersen affair had begun to heal. Yet no-one was considering the chances of England ending their winless run against India yesterday. All attention was focused on a senior player accused of a physical assault on an opponent, and a junior one who embarrassed himself in a Nottingham nightclub four days before one of the biggest games of his career.

Pictures of a drunk Gary Ballance will do little to improve the image of a national side looking to win back the affections of a disillusioned public, even if England insist he had been given a night off and there was no impropriety.

More worrying was the prospect of their best bowler being suspended at a time when they desperately need a victory, any victory, to end the gloom created by the worst tour in England’s history and a run of nine Tests without a win.

Physical contact is the great taboo of cricket, the ‘crime’ that players are forbidden to commit on the field, however heated the verbal exchanges. And it is the extent of the contact between Jimmy Anderson and Ravindra Jadeja in the narrow staircase in the Trent Bridge pavilion at lunch on the second day of the first Test that lies at the heart of an escalating and nasty dispute.

Make no mistake, this is serious. Level Three charges are rare in international cricket and the game has not seen one for six years, since India’s Harbhajan Singh was accused of making a racist comment to Australia’s Andrew Symonds.

Verbals: Anderson and Jadeja have a frank exchange of views out in the middle on day two of the first Test

Tension: James Anderson waits to talk to Ravindra Jadeja and MS Dhoni at they walk off for lunch

Jellybeangate: Zaheer Khan (centre) gestures to the ground where he said the sweets were in 2007

No England player has faced an accusation
as serious as this under the International Cricket Council’s code of
conduct. Anderson, who faces a four-match ban, is said to be bemused
and hurt by the accusation.

Yet it is a charge that India, and
specifically their captain MS Dhoni, are insisting on which has led to a
near breakdown in relations between the teams.

It is what happened
in those moments when Anderson clashed with Jadeja and Dhoni as both
teams entered the famous old pavilion and prepared to turn right, at the
bottleneck where one staircase leads to both dressing rooms, that will
determine the extent of Anderson’s punishment.

Dhoni has driven this
charge, despite the efforts of the ICC and senior officials from both
nations to broker peace, and as the most powerful man in Indian and
world cricket, what Dhoni says goes.

England’s retaliation was
confirmed last night when a Level Two charge was brought on Jadeja —
England don’t want to fall into the trap of backing long bans for both
players — with the India spinner accused of ‘turning suddenly and taking
steps towards Anderson in an aggressive and threatening manner’. It
was certainly more sudden turn than Jadeja managed with his innocuous
spin bowling at Trent Bridge.

So what happened? England insist Jadeja
was the aggressor as the players, in single file, prepared to climb the
rickety Trent Bridge staircase, moving aggressively towards Anderson
after a verbal on-field clash.

India view things differently and
consider Anderson guilty of breaking that taboo by ‘pushing and abusing’
Jadeja. Or are they, as Alastair Cook suggested, playing a tactical
game to rid this series of England’s most important bowler?

Nobody
doubts physical contact took place. It is what Anderson (below) did to
get Jadeja ‘out of his space’ that will determine, initially in a
preliminary hearing on Tuesday, the extent of any punishment.

Both
sides claim to have witnesses and Sportsmail understands that several
stewards will give evidence for England. It is their word and that of
India’s witnesses, who include reserves Ishwar Pandey and Pankaj Singh,
that the ICC’s judicial commissioner must consider. Most players have
taken the ‘Arsene Wenger’ approach, as Cook put it, and claim to have
seen nothing. India were quick to act, making a complaint to the ICC the
very next day. An ICC lawyer then flew to England and spoke to both
sides in a vain attempt to resolve the matter.

ECB chairman Giles Clarke could do nothing to dissuade Dhoni from his confrontational path. Yet
it must be pertinent that the clash happened out of the public eye. If
the players had come together on the field there could be no doubt what
happened. But the wider public must wonder why it could not have been
resolved in private.

Peter Moores must wonder what on earth he has
taken on returning as England coach. He was last night reminding
Ballance and other England players who went out on Sunday night,
including Anderson, of their responsibilities.

But it is the prospect of losing Anderson that will concern him most and which will lead to a tense atmosphere at Lord’s.

The stakes are high now both on and off the most famous cricket field in the world.

ENGLAND'S YEAR OF TROUBLE

ROOT ROCKED (June 2013)

The
angelic looking Joe Root winds up Australia opener David Warner so much
in the VIP area of the Walkabout bar in Birmingham that the loudmouth
Aussie punches the young Tyke.

BROAD WALK (July)

The
mother of all rows erupts when Stuart Broad edges an Ashton Agar
delivery to Aussie captain Michael Clarke at first slip. Incredibly,
umpire Aleem Dar fails to spot the huge nick, Broad stands his ground...
and there follows all manner of hypocritical spoutings from Aussies
over not walking.

TROTT TORMENT (Nov)

Bully
boy Warner is at it again, this time with the verbals, saying Jonathan
Trott is ‘poor, weak and looked scared’ facing Mitchell Johnson. Trott
was already on his way home, suffering from a ‘stress-related
condition’.

MANKAD MESS (June 2014)

Controversy
at Edgbaston as Sri Lanka spinner Sachithra Senanayake — who himself
was later suspended over a suspect action — runs out England
wicketkeeper Jos Buttler for backing up too far, a dismissal known as a
Mankad. The bad blood spills over into the Test series.